December 25, 2016

Just wanted to send a little holiday cheer this morning. Whether this is a time of healing, a time of long awaited celebration, a time of anticipation and excitement, or a time of letting this year go to focus on new beginnings, I wish everyone lots of love and luck. And I share a picture of Momo, now 21 months old, running on the beach in LaLa Land in December! She is my constant reminder that anything is possible and is my daily dose of hope that miracles can happen.

December 16, 2016

The end of the year can be a really hard time for some people, especially those on IF Island, and it's understandable. A reminder of another year gone. A feeling of grief about thinking you'd be spending the holidays being able to share joys of expecting. Realizing the very real limitations the cost infertility has had on your life -- socially, financially, emotionally-- perhaps not being able to travel like you used to or feeling socially isolated and just not in a very spirited mood. I get it. I get all of it. But I also want to explore the flip side, because I think it's always helpful to look at opposites when we get stuck in a feeling or thinking patterns that feels crappy.

Somethings just are what they are. Money lost might just mean no vacation this year. But other things are, or can be, different with a shift in the ways we think.

Often times when one door closes, it means another open might open. It might be a door you NEVER thought you'd be standing in front of, but yet there you are, and the truth might be that behind this door is the resolution you've been after. After the door to my own ovaries was closed-- ok that is not worded well at all but you know what I mean, after we realized my eggs were probably not going to yield us the result we were after, a baby, I was devastated but also able to focus on the next possible solution. Donor eggs. When that door got slammed shut, I thought my heart was going to explode into a zillion pieces and just couldn't fathom any other options or opportunity, and then we discovered embryo donation. With each door that got shut, we had to grieve and reassess and figure some stuff out, but once we did we could see that a there was another option-- just one we didn't plan on or even think of.

With 2016 coming to an end, it's easy to get caught up in everything that didn't happen. Or regrets. Or everything that did happen that you regret. We all get caught up in these arbitrary timelines and the "shoulds" that dictate our lives that we often can't help taking stock at the end of the year. But what if instead we just decided that the year is gone, and everything that happened are the stepping stones to the new opportunities that are waiting for us in the New Year?

That feels better to me. Giving yourself a break knowing each of us does the best we can in any given moment. New beginnings. New opportunities.

December 09, 2016

Her ex-husband wants the embryos, who are for whatever reason named Emma and Isabella.

A "right-t0-live" lawsuit apparently has been filed on her embryos behalf in the state of Louisiana.

"The new lawsuit contends that Emma and Isabella, by not being born, have been deprived of an inheritance from a trust that has been created for them."

"The suit accuses Vergara of refusing “to allow her daughters Emma and Isabella to continue their development, so they remain frozen in a tank,’’ sources said."

I don't even know where to go from here but I can't help but feel that sensationalized celeb infertility shenanigans don't seem to help our cause and only further creates fear and this sense that there are frozen half formed babies screaming from dark cavernous freezers.

How do we start to normalize IVF and various assisted reproductive and third party procedures? How do we help fertility problems be understood as the medical issues that they are rather than a political or social issue? I understand that there will always be strong feelings around creating life, but when I read stuff like this-- that these embryos should be born so they can get their trust fund money-- I just cringe. It also makes it sounds so easy-- like these babies are like those croissants that come in a tube and all you need to do is pop them into an oven and there you go!

Is it just me who reads stuff like this and goes, "ugh," or should I focus on a possible positive in that a celeb is open about going through IVF and having made frozen embryos? Does that in and of itself help to normalize?

What to do with frozen embryos is a real issue for a lot of people. And it is complicated. But it should also be thought about on the front end of a situation, and what happens to frozen embryos after divorce or separation is definitely one of those front end considerations.

More things to think about I suppose.

Happy Friday everyone. I really appreciate all the comments and connecting through comments and wish everyone luck and they move forward in their "journey." I noticed some folks moving to donor eggs and I send so much positive energy your way!